August 21, 2010

In which Ed Miliband reveals himself to be a tool

As if the wholesale jacking of civil liberties, and basic hypocrisy wasn’t enough, it seems that we’ve established objectionable tone of the Labour party, which is to undermine the Liberal Democrat Party at every stage. Look at this spectacular piece of concern trolling from Ed “someone I once considered the less objectionable of the brothers” Miliband:

Today Miliband also wrote the Lib Dem leader saying that in sanctioning the appointment of Sir Philip Green as the government’s new austerity tsar, Clegg had abandoned the commitment he made to tackle tax avoidance.

Miliband said: “You said, if in government, you would raise £2.4bn by attacking income tax avoidance, £1.4bn by halting abuse of corporation tax and a further £750m from stamp duty through tackling offshore registration by non-doms. You claimed your plans to clamp down on tax avoidance meant you would not need to raise VAT. However, since the election you have had a very different message for the country.”

I’m surprised he didn’t add “why do you hate the troops?”.

Either Miliband is stupid and doesn’t really realise how coalition governments work for the junior partner, or he’s being a disingenuous prick. Now, I’ll let you draw your own conclusions on that one (SPOILER ALERT: It’s the latter), it becomes clear that, as if to emulate the US Republican Party* as far as strategy goes, they’ve essentially committed themselves (or at the very least Ed has) to destroying another party by any means necessary.

Speaking to Kilmarnock Labour party during a tour of Scottish constituencies, the younger Miliband urged Lib Dems to desert the party. “We have to make the Lib Dems an endangered species, and then extinct,” he explained. Ironically, Kennedy, whose Highland seat was once Labour-held and remains anti-Tory, is thought to favour Ed Miliband’s candidacy for Labour leader. Lib Dem MPs in Scotland and the North are aware how vulnerable unpopular coalition policies could make them among their constituents.

That’s right, make the third party of this country, the only thing that can temper us from see-sawing between politico-tribal warfare forever, extinct. Ed Miliband wants a return to the two party system. Because let us be utterly clear, like most Labour hacks, there is little in the mind of the smaller Miliband than victory for his party and the perpetual dominance of their ideology. And I suppose that’s almost fair enough, given that’s kind of why political parties think they exist. But he and those like him mean for it to be forever, when this, from Massie, is a better explanation of things:

Not everything Labour did in office was terrible and, in any case, there needed to be a correction after 18 years of Conservative rule. Similarly this present government was needed to replace an exhausted, fagged-out Labour ministry. None of this is terribly mysterious but it’s oft-forgotten amidst the hurly-burly of the Westminster village. It may be that Mill’s belief that, eventually, each party improves the other is overly-optimistic but, looking at recent British political history, he’d seem to have been proven correct.

What pisses me off is that the only thing Labour seem to have to offer is a perpetual onslaught on the Liberal Democrat party. This is their policy, purely because they see it as the best way to scupper the Tory lead government because of their tribal hatred of all things Conservative. It kind of explains why they abandon their purported progressive principles Whoever leads the party from next month, I fully predict they will forget their Damascene conversion to electoral reform from May (a pathetic last minute power grab) and do everything between now and then to undermine the Liberal Democrats with their base. And all because the latter didn’t behave like the Labour protest vote they were always assumed to be.

Let’s face it, Labour are utterly terrified of the possibility that the Coalition might actually work. If, in 2015, the economy has rebounded, the deficit is reduced and there’s a new voting system in town, they’re doomed to irrelevancy for a decade. Which is perfectly fitting.

*Yes, I just made that comparison. They’re not as evil as them, of course